


A Solution

by deathishauntedbyhumans



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Fluff, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Male Character, Consensual Violence, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Gay Male Character, M/M, Minor Violence, Therapy, These Boys are a MESS, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-20
Updated: 2018-11-20
Packaged: 2019-08-26 11:19:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16680610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathishauntedbyhumans/pseuds/deathishauntedbyhumans
Summary: Lance thinks he knows how to solve the problem when Keith gets so angry and frustrated with the world that he might just explode. His solution is... problematic, at best.





	A Solution

**Author's Note:**

> I had this idea in the shower and wrote it all in one sitting in about an hour and a half. I also haven’t watched Voltron in... a year? More than a year??? Rip me I guess.
> 
> This is actually lowkey based off a roleplay I did two-thousand years ago so go figure.

They’ve been in a fight for four hours.

Lance honestly can’t remember what the fight was even about. Keith had come back to the dorm in a snit and had started ragging on him for something. Towels on the floor? Leaving the hot plate on?

It wasn’t like it fucking mattered, really. Lance had apologised, but Keith hadn’t let it go, and it had escalated to the point where they’d both started yelling, until Keith had thrown an eraser at him from across the room and then collapsed at his desk in a huff. Lance loved his roommate —he did, he really fucking did, much more than he should have— but sometimes he couldn’t _stand_ him.

Curled up in his bed on the other side of the room, Lance stares dejectedly at Keith. He’s long-past angry, long-past bitter. He’s apologetic for even letting their petty argument get so out of hand, and… he feels _bad_ , because despite their differences, he feels like he knows Keith pretty well. And when Keith gets… like this, there’s usually an underlying reason that’ll get shoved under the rug until they’re both drunk or Keith has a breakdown.

An idea that’s been riding somewhere at the back of his mind for a while resurfaces, and Lance considers it for a few minutes, all while watching Keith speculatively. He isn’t sure what else he can do.

So he stands up and crosses the room. He can see Keith’s shoulders tense.

“Keith. Hit me,” Lance says, breaking the silence that’s been thick between them for the last two hours and forty minutes.

For a second, it looks like Keith forgets his anger entirely, because he spins around in his chair and stares at Lance in disbelief.

“ _What?”_

“I want you to hit me,” Lance repeats calmly. “I think it’ll help.”

Keith’s eyebrows knit together, anger settling back over his features faster than it takes Lance to blink. “What the fuck, Lance?”

“You’re angry,” Lance says plainly, spreading his arms wide. “You need to get it out. I want you to do it. Hit me.”

“Fuck you,” Keith spits. He makes to spin his chair back towards the desk, but Lance takes another step forward and grabs ahold of the back of the seat to stop him.

“Come on. Hit me. Just do it.”

“No!” Keith repeats, his frustration obvious.

Lance reaches for him then, grabbing his arm and pulling him out of the chair. He braces himself, because he _knows_ Keith.

And sure enough, he gets the reaction he expects.

As if on instinct, Keith lashes out at the touch, his arm flying out of Lance’s grip, hand smacking him hard across the face. Lance reels back, biting his lip to keep from making any kind of sound; he doesn’t have a moment to recover before Keith pushes him hard in the chest and sends him stumbling backwards.

“Fuck you,” Keith snarls out again. Lance tries to regain his footing, and when he can feel the floor beneath him, he straightens up, one hand covering the cheek Keith had hit. He grins.

“Hit me again.”

“ _Fuck you.”_

Despite his protestation, Keith leaps at him, shoving him backwards again, this time with a healthy hit to his stomach. Lance doubles over, breath leaving in a _whoosh_ , and stumbles again, the backs of his knees hitting Keith’s bed. Keith’s hands shove at his shoulders hard and he falls. He doesn’t make any move to fight back, to stop him. He lets it happen.

Keith kicks at one of his legs, but it’s half-hearted. A second later, Lance hears rather than sees him turn away, and he opens eyes that he hadn’t meant to close to see Keith in profile facing the wall, chest heaving.

As Lance watches, Keith’s breathing slowly evens out. When he finally turns his head towards Lance again, there’s something vulnerable in his eyes.

“Lance—“ he begins, but Lance sits up slowly, shaking his head. His ribs hurt a little, and his cheek stings, but he knows he’ll be fine. He’s been through worse before and still come out on top.

“It’s okay,” he says, and Keith looks like he’s going to argue, but when he opens his mouth, nothing comes out. So he closes it again.

Abruptly, Keith turns away. “I’m going to get you an ice pack,” he says quietly, and Lance knows it’s an apology, even if Keith doesn’t realise it.

* * *

Lance’s physics class is cancelled for the third time in a month, so he finds a nice patchy spot of shade and sunlight under a tree by the creek on campus and lays his jacket underneath himself like a picnic blanket. He’s half-asleep when he hears footsteps, and he’s proud of himself for identifying them as Keith’s even before he opens his eyes.

When he _does_ open his eyes, Keith is standing above him, red-faced and out of breath.

“Hey?” Lance greets, more a question than a statement. Keith glares at a spot that’s not his face but is somewhere near it and doesn’t respond. “...You okay, buddy?”

“I’m going to kill someone,” Keith growls eventually. His hands are balled into fists at his sides. Lance scoots upright and pats his jacket, and Keith stares down at the spot for nearly a minute before all-too-suddenly collapsing down beside him.

“What happened?” Lance asks, concerned.

Keith is silent again, until the answer bursts out of him, apparently too big to be contained. “There was a fucking gay rights thing today and these assholes from some fucking church decided to come and fucking— fucking—“ Keith trails off, but Lance gets the gist of it enough to understand what’s going on.

“Shit, dude. I’m sorry. Was it local?” _Were you there_ is the unspoken question, but it’s loud in the space between them.

Keith nods in one jerky movement. “Pidge and her girlfriend were going and asked if I wanted to come. And then we get there and everything was in fucking chaos.” He snorts angrily. “I’m sure it’ll be on the fucking news later. The assholes had pepper spray and fucking… I don’t even know. They were shooting BB guns or some shit.” He gestures to his jacket, to a small divot in the leather near his elbow. Lance notices only then that his hands are shaking. “Pidge and Madyson were helping with the cleanup, but they forced me to come back here. Called me a fucking Über and everything.” Keith glares down at the ground. “I’m gonna fucking strangle someone.”

“Hit me.” The words rise, unbidden, to Lance’s lips, but he doesn’t regret them when they escape. Keith’s head whips up hard, and Lance meets his gaze seriously.

“Lance,” is the only thing Keith says, but his voice is dangerous. A warning. Lance stands up and offers Keith a hand.

“There’s nobody around. I won’t tell anyone. I know it’ll help.”

Keith accepts the hand warily, pulling himself up to stand face-to-face with Lance. He looks unsure, but there’s still anger written plainly on his face, a frustration that won’t go away without doing something about it.

“I don’t mind,” Lance says quietly. He makes himself as serious as he possibly can, because he needs Keith to understand that this isn’t a joke. This isn’t something he’s doing to have something on him later on. This is… Lance doing his best to help.

Keith stares at him for another moment, studying him, and then swallows hard and nods. It’s that same jerky motion from before, like it’s hard to move, and Lance can only imagine that it is. Keith holds so much _tension_ , so much _hurt_ and _hardship_ in his body. That can’t be easy to deal with.

Without any other warning than that, Keith pitches forward towards him, one hand swinging around and catching him in the chin. Lance hisses a little from the shock of it, but balls his own hands into fists to ground himself and looks back at Keith when he can.

“Again,” he says, and his voice cracks, but it seems to be the only invitation Keith needs.

Lance loses track of how many times Keith’s fists connect with his body. By the end of it, he’s on the ground, nose bleeding, ribs aching. Keith is breathing heavily, on his knees beside him. Lance feels the shift when the blows stop coming, when Keith just sits and _breathes_ above him, and he squints up to see Keith staring at him. Their gazes lock, and slowly, achingly, Lance smiles.

Keith swallows hard. Lance can see his Adam’s apple bob. And then Keith is grabbing for Lance’s jacket and lifts Lance’s head carefully to tuck it beneath him before he lies down beside him in the dirt, wordlessly curling up to his side. 

“I’ll go with you to the next one,” Lance whispers, letting his eyes fall closed. He moves his arm, ignoring the way his shoulder protests. “We’ll fuck those bastards up together. Bi pride, right, Mullet?”

Keith shuffles in tighter, head just barely leaning on Lance’s shoulder. It doesn’t hurt much, so Lance doesn’t say anything. Instead, he wraps his arm lightly over Keith.

“Shut up, Lance,” Keith murmurs back, but he reaches for Lance’s hand and grips it firmly anyways.

* * *

The end of the semester comes in a blur of colour and light and sound. There are parties upon parties to attend. Classes are winding down, finals are nearly over. The majority of dorm life is leaving, save for the building Keith and Lance are in. The year-round program isn’t for everyone, but it has its merits. They get to keep each other as roommates, for one thing. And there are two weeks between Spring and Fall semesters into the shorter Summer and Winter ones where they don’t have to do _anything_ related to school at all.

“Tell me again,” Lance giggles. He’s just past tipsy and not quite drunk, leaning against Keith on the floor of their dorm.

Keith has consumed considerably less alcohol, but seems to be the same amount of sober. “L _aaa_ nce. I’ve told you the story three times already tonight!” he complains, and Lance giggles some more.

“ _Fiiine_. Have it your way.” He tries to pout through his laughter, and he knows it doesn’t work, but he does it anyways because it makes Keith laugh, and Keith’s laughter is _beautiful_.

Keith takes a swig from the bottle of fancy-looking brandy Madyson and Pidge had given Lance for his last birthday and then hands it over to Lance, who does the same and then cringes, the way he always does when he drinks.

Keith laughs again, but the laughter dies abruptly. When Lance glances over to find the problem, he can see Keith watching him contemplatively.

“You’re too drunk to think,” Lance states, and Keith huffs and nudges at him.

“Am not.”

Lance nudges him back and offers the bottle; Keith nudges him back and declines.

“I was just thinking—“ Keith begins.

“You’re too drunk!” Lance interrupts. Keith sticks his tongue out childishly before he continues.

“I was _thinking_ about the whole… _hitting you_ thing,” he says. Lance makes a face.

“Why?” he asks. “Are you mad now?”

“No!” Keith shakes his head. “I’m… happy, right now.” He looks a little confused to admit it, but there’s a pleasant surprise in his tone. “But I— I don’t get it. I mean, the first time was kinda… an accident, but not, and then it happened again, and now it happens all the time, and… you get hurt.”

“So?”

“ _So_ —“ Keith says emphatically. “—you get hurt! And that’s— that’s not okay!”

Lance shakes his head. “I don’t mind.”

“You always say that,” Keith accuses.

“Because it’s true.”

Keith groans, dropping his head down against Lance’s shoulder. “But it’s not okay. Even if you don’t _mind,_ it’s not _okay.”_ And then softer, in a mumble Lance barely hears, he adds, “It makes me a bad person.”

Lance jerks his head towards Keith, bumping his chin lightly against the top of Keith’s head in the process. “Ow,” he says reflexively, even though it doesn’t actually hurt. Keith doesn’t move. “Keith. You’re not a bad person.”

“Yeah, I am. Good people don’t hit… other people.” There’s a hesitation that Lance’s fogged mind skips right over, but it _is_ there nonetheless.

“But I _ask_ you to hit me. Man, I _tell_ you to. I know it makes you feel better.”

“Yeah, for a minute!” Keith exclaims, finally pulling his head back up. He stares, wild-eyed, at Lance, their faces _tooclosetooclosetooclose_ too close for Lance to think. “Then I just wanna hit _myself_ because I hurt you!”

“Oh,” Lance says dumbly, because… that had never occurred to him before. “Really.”

“Yeah.” Keith is flushed, and Lance can’t tell if it’s because of the brandy or the heat in the room or something else entirely. “I need to… learn how to control myself. I _want_ to. That means… not hitting you.”

“Oh,” Lance repeats. Guilt claws at his stomach. “I’m sorry.”

“ _What?”_ Shock paints itself over Keith’s face. “Why are you sorry?!”

“I told you to hit me. I made things worse,” Lance explains, though it feels obvious. Keith shakes his head vehemently, and then reaches forward, his hands settling clumsily on Lance’s shoulders.

“You never made me do anything that I… that I couldn’t— Ugh. I never did it because you _made_ me do it. I hit you because you offered, yeah, but it’s also easier than actually dealing with… y’know.” One hand lifts from Lance’s shoulder to gesture vaguely in the air beside his head. “Shit.” He drops it back to Lance’s shoulder. “It did help for a little bit, but I don’t… I don’t like hurting people. I don’t like hurting _you.”_ He’s quiet for a moment. “I made an appointment with one of the counselors in the health centre. The… personal counsellor ones? It comes with the whole health thing we pay for and I think it might help and I want to learn how to get rid of the stuff I feel without making your life harder and hurting you,” he says in a rush.

Lance stares at him a second in shock, and then he starts to smile. “Fuck, Keith. I’m so proud of you, man. That’s awesome. You actually made an appointment.”

Keith’s hands are still on Lance’s shoulders, but he looks down almost shyly. “Yeah. I did. I figured it would be a step in the right direction.”

Lance reaches up to his own shoulders after setting the now-capped brandy down beside him, squeezing Keith’s hands on instinct. “It is, dude. I…” He trails off, considering his words as carefully as he can. “For what it’s worth, I am sorry I didn’t help you find something better to do.”

“Don’t be.” Keith turns both his hands palm up, lacing his fingers with Lance’s. “We’re in college, Lance. Neither of us have any idea what’s going on, ever. That’s just how it is.”

Lance lets a surprised giggle out. “You right,” he replies. He leans forward, so that their foreheads are pressed together lightly. “I’m fuckin’ proud of you, man,” he repeats, and Keith laughs. Lance can feel Keith’s breath against his own lips.

“You said that already,” he murmurs, and Lance can feel him tilting his head.

“I know. ‘s still true,” Lance murmurs back. He tilts his own head in response.

Keith laughs again, and then leans forward just a little bit more and closes the distance between them for good, lips pressing gently against Lance’s in a soft promise of a better, healthier future.

**Author's Note:**

> _gay_
> 
>  
> 
> Kudos/comments are love. Come scream at me on tumblr @deathishauntedbyhumans!!


End file.
